Examining robustness of bipedal robot walking with artificial sensitive skin

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Gordon Cheng
• Subject Area: Automation, Mechatronics, Control Systems, Intelligent Technical Systems, Robotics
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 502086040

Humanoid robot's biped balance and locomotion is a challenging task due to the naturally unstable dynamics of floating base systems. The project “Examining robustness of bipedal robot walking with artificial sensitive skin” aims at enabling humanoid robots to walk over uneven and narrow terrains more robustly with artificial sensitive skin. This will be supported by the development of a ROS-based software control framework. The human foot sole is covered with an endurable layer of glabrous skin that apart from protecting the foot from rough surfaces, provides rich sensorial information about the terrain such as texture, hardness, temperature, and pressure distribution on the foothold. Today, most humanoids robots are only equipped with ankle joint torque-force sensors, they cannot account for any kind of surface contact (any kind of contact geometry) when making movements. If humanoid robots are to be used more in environments made for human beings, they need to be able to walk, balance on various kinds of ground and surfaces.With the help of the robotic skin developed by the Institute for Cognitive Systems over the past years, a humanoid robot equipped with skin sensors on the sole of its feet has been developed. The artificial tactile sensors can provide spatial information on the physical interaction forces. Such information can be useful to improve the capabilities of robotic systems and control methods. This project focuses on the investigation of the benefits that plantar tactile sensation provides for continuous walking control. Different sensing modalities of robot skin will be examined for walking on uneven terrain in two different walking controllers without significant modifications will be the target. We will investigate how skin information can be used to adapt online the walking motions for stepping on unexpected obstacles, especially in the case of small-size/narrow footholds. The use of plantar proximity sensing for pre-emptive foot compliance will be investigated, which could provide a sensing modality that may enable the foot to adapt its orientation before foot landing using the proximity-to-ground as a reference for control. The framework will be tested in two different full-size humanoid robots running on two different walking controllers.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants